This report for the second year of the 2023–2024 legislative session focuses on California legislators’ votes on California Chamber of Commerce priority bills.
This is the 50th vote record the CalChamber has compiled in response to numerous requests from member firms and local chambers of commerce that would like a gauge by which to measure the performance of their legislators.
View print-friendly pdf of vote record.
Partial Picture
No vote record can tell the entire story of a legislator’s attitude and actions on issues of importance to business. To fully evaluate your legislative representative, consult the legislative journals and examine your legislator’s votes in committee and on floor issues.
You can view these via links at www.calchambervotes.com.
Many anti-business bills were rejected by legislators in policy or fiscal committees, thus stopping proposals before they reached the floor for a vote.
Most bills in this report cover major business issues that are of concern to both small and large companies.
The CalChamber recognizes that there are many bills supported or opposed by business that are not included in this vote record and analysis.
Factors Considered
The CalChamber considers the following factors in selecting vote record bills:
• The bills and votes reflect legislators’ attitudes toward private enterprise, fiscal responsibility and the business climate.
• Each bill was a CalChamber priority in a particular field. Priority bills generally have appeared in the “Status Report” sections of Alert.
• This year’s vote record charts show selected key committee votes where a committee’s actions stopped an onerous proposal before it could be voted on by the entire house.
• The vote record also covers 11 bills voted on by the full Senate and 9 bills voted on by the full Assembly.
• Unless otherwise noted, final floor votes are shown. Concurrence votes are considered final votes.
When ‘Not Voting’ Helps
Sometimes a legislator is unwilling to vote against a colleague but is willing to support the CalChamber’s opposition to a bill. In such cases, a legislator may abstain from voting, which will hinder passage of a bill, just as a “no” vote does.
To recognize that not voting can aid the CalChamber’s opposition to a bill, the vote record includes the number of times legislators did not vote “aye” on a CalChamber-opposed bill in the total for the column listing actions “in accord with” the CalChamber’s position, if the legislator was not absent for the day.
Priority Bills
Artificial Intelligence/Privacy
• AB 2481 (Lowenthal; D-Long Beach) Youth Social Media Protection Act. Requires “large social media platforms” to create a process to verify an expansive list of individuals as “verified reporters,” including school principals and counselors, among others. Passed Assembly, May 22, 46-0. Passed Senate, August 29, 31-3. Assembly concurred in Senate amendments, August 31, 58-0. Signed—Chapter 832. CalChamber Opposed.
• AB 2930 (Bauer-Kahan; D-Orinda) Automated Decision Tools (ADT) Impact Assessments. Requires developers and deployers of ADTs to perform specified impact assessments prior to first using an ADT and annually thereafter, impacting every industry and businesses of all sizes, in addition to public entities. Passed Assembly, May 21, 50-14. Senate Inactive File August 31. CalChamber Opposed.
• SB 1047 (Wiener; D-San Francisco) AI Models. Requires frontier AI developers to comply with certain requirements before beginning to initially train specified “covered models” to promote the safe and secure innovation of AI. Passed Senate, May 21, 32-1 (vote shown). Passed Assembly, August 28, 48-16. Senate concurred in Assembly amendments August 29, 30-9. Vetoed. CalChamber Opposed.
Climate Change
• SB 1497 (Menjivar; D-Los Angeles) Polluters Pay Climate Cost Recovery Act of 2024. Imposes an ill-defined tax on a broad set of entities that will increase costs for goods and services in California. Passed Senate Environmental Quality Committee, April 17, 5-2 (vote shown). Passed Senate Judiciary Committee, April 23, 7-2 (vote shown). Senate Inactive File, May 22. Failed deadline. CalChamber Opposed/Job Killer 2024.
Environmental Regulation
• ACA 16 (Bryan; D-Los Angeles) Environmental Rights. Has far-reaching negative consequences that would impair government operations, stunt development for new housing, infrastructure and clean energy project development and the strong potential to destabilize California’s economy. Passed Assembly Natural Resources Committee, April 8, 8-3. Passed Assembly Appropriations Committee, May 16, 11-4. Assembly floor, May 20. Failed deadline. Oppose/Job Killer 2024.
Health Care
• AB 2200 (Kalra; D-San Jose) Government-Run Health Care. Forces all Californians into a new untested state government health plan, with no ability to opt out while eliminating Medicare for California seniors and increasing taxes at least $250 billion a year on workers, income, jobs, goods and services. Passed Assembly Health Committee, April 23, 9-4. Held in Assembly Appropriations Suspense File, May 16. Failed deadline. Oppose/Job Killer 2024.
• AB 3129 (Wood; D-Healdsburg) Stifles Free Market Transactions for Health Entities. Requires private investors to obtain the consent of the California Attorney General before acquiring or effecting a change of control with respect to certain health care entities. Passed Assembly, May 21, 50-16. Passed Senate, August 31, 21-11. Assembly concurred in Senate amendments, August 31, 49-14. Vetoed. Oppose.
Housing and Land Use
• AB 98 (J. Carrillo; D-Palmdale) Warehouse Compromise. Provides a reasonable compromise that avoids the negative economic and environmental impacts that would arise from much more stringent and unworkable legislation while still addressing community concerns. Passed Senate, August 31, 22-16. Assembly concurred in Senate amendments, August 31, 46-17. Signed—Chapter 931. CalChamber neutral urging aye vote.
Labor and Employment
• AB 2288 (Kalra; D-San Jose) Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA). Creates a long-overdue reform of PAGA. Passed Senate, June 27, 39-0. Assembly concurred in Senate amendments, June 27, 77-0. Signed—Chapter 44. CalChamber Supported.
• AB 2374(Haney; D-San Francisco) Joint Liability for Businesses of All Sizes. Originally imposed new statutory joint liability on business of any size that contracts for janitorial services if a contractor violates the Displaced Janitor Opportunity Act and placed new mandates on those businesses that should be assigned to the contractor. Job killer status removed due to May 16, 2024 amendments removing joint liability portion of the bill and making other changes. CalChamber remains opposed unless amended due to the requirement that an awarding authority must provide certain notifications to a union representing another entity’s employees. Passed Assembly Labor and Employment Committee, April 3, 5-1 (vote shown). Passed Assembly, May 22, 52-11. In Senate Appropriations Suspense File, August 5. Failed deadline CalChamber Opposed Unless Amended/Former Job Killer 2024.
• AB 2499 (Schiavo; D-Chatsworth) Leave Expansion. Significantly expands 12-week leave related to crimes and lowers threshold of applicability to employers with just five employees. Job Killer tag removed due to May 20, 2024 amendments and June 6, 2024 amendments applying leave to employers with 25 or more employees, limiting qualifying reasons for taking leave, and limiting duration of time for specific qualifying reasons. Passed Assembly Labor and Employment Committee, April 3, 5-0 (vote shown). Passed Assembly Judiciary Committee, April 16, 7-2 (vote shown). Passed Assembly May 23, 56-8. Passed Senate, August 27, 32-7. Assembly concurred in Senate amendments, August 28, 60-11. Signed—Chapter 967. CalChamber Opposed/Former Job Killer 2024.
• AB 2751 (Haney; D-San Francisco) Prohibition on Employee Communications During Certain Hours. Prohibits any employee working for an employer of any size from contacting another employee outside of their normal work hours except in very narrow circumstances and would subject employer to costly litigation for any dispute as to whether the communication was permissible. Passed Assembly Labor and Employment Committee, April 17, 4-2. In Assembly Appropriations Suspense File, May 8. Failed deadline. Oppose/Job Killer 2024.
• SB 92 (Umberg; D-Santa Ana) Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA). Creates a long-overdue reform of PAGA. Passed Assembly, June 27, 76-0. Senate concurred in Assembly amendments, June 27, 40-0. Signed—Chapter 45. CalChamber Supported.
• SB 399 (Wahab; D-Hayward) Bans Employer Speech. Chills employer speech regarding religious and political matters, including unionization. Is likely unconstitutional under the First Amendment and preempted by the National Labor Relations Act. Passed Assembly, August 30, 51-17. Senate concurred in Assembly amendments, August 31, 31-9. Signed—Chapter 670. CalChamber Opposed/Two Year Job Killer.
• SB 1446 (Smallwood-Cuevas; D-Los Angeles) Use of Technology in Grocery and Retail Stores. Overly prescriptive mandate regarding the use of self-checkout stations that will frustrate customers and increase costs to retailers and requires stores to notify all workers and the public any time they choose to utilize new technology. Passed Senate, May 21, 25-12. In Assembly Rules Committee, August 15. Failed deadline. CalChamber Opposed.
Product Regulation
• SB 903 (Skinner; D-Berkeley) Bans All Uses of PFAS. Prohibits the use of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in all commercial and consumer products by 2032 unless Department of Toxic Substances Control is petitioned and makes an affirmative determination that the PFAS in a particular product is an unavoidable use. Passed Senate Environmental Quality Committee, April 3, 4-2 (vote shown). In Senate Appropriations Suspense File, April 29. Failed Deadline. CalChamber Opposed/Job Killer 2024.
Taxation
• AB 2829 (Papan; D-San Mateo) Tax on Digital Advertising Revenue. Implements a new tax on digital ads of 5%. In addition to increasing taxes on businesses, it is likely unconstitutional. Passed Assembly Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee, April 23, 6-3 (vote shown). In Assembly Revenue and Taxation Suspense File, April 29. Failed deadline. Oppose/Job Killer 2024.
• SB 1327 (Glazer; D-Contra Costa) Tax on Digital Advertising Revenue. Implements a discriminatory 7.25% tax on the revenue generated from the sale of digital advertising. The bill is likely unconstitutional and will lead to costly litigation for the state. Passed Senate, June 27, 27-7. In Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee, August 8. Failed deadline. CalChamber Opposed/Job Killer 2024.
Unemployment Insurance
• SB 1116 (Portantino; D-Burbank) Increased Unemployment Insurance Taxes to Subsidize Striking Workers. Allows striking workers to claim UI benefits when they choose to strike. Because the UI Fund is paid for entirely by employers, SB 1116 will effectively add more debt onto California employers. Moreover, SB 1116 will effectively force employers to subsidize strikes at completely unrelated businesses because the UI Fund’s debt adds taxes for all employers, regardless of whether they’ve had a strike. Passed Senate, May 21, 22-12. Failed passage in Assembly Insurance Committee, June 26, 6-2. CalChamber Opposed/Job Killer 2024.
Water Supply
• AB 2079 (Bennett; D-Ventura) Groundwater Restriction. Prevents installation of new or replacement groundwater wells throughout much of the state. Circumvents the local control component of Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) by creating statewide stringent requirements on wells rather than empowering locally informed solutions to groundwater sustainability. Passed Assembly, May 20, 41-17. Failed passage in Senate Natural Resources and Water Committee, June 11, 5-6. Failed deadline. CalChamber Opposed Unless Amended.
